understand you, except that you're desperate wrong. But I saw you--
saw you by the lookin'-glass, behind there; and 'tis right you should
know.'

'O' course you saw me. . . . I'm not blamin', am I? You had to do
it, and I had to take it. That was the easiest way. I couldn' do no
other, an' you couldn' do no other, that bein' your duty. An' the
child, there--'

Sergeant Wilkes turned for a moment to the child, who met his gaze,
round-eyed; then to his friend again.

But the corporal's head had dropped forward on his chest.

The sergeant touched his shoulder, to make sure; then, with one look
behind him, but ignoring the child, reeled out of the room and down
the stairs, as in a dream. In the sunny garden the fresh air revived
him and he paused to stare at a rose-bush, rampant, covered with
white blossoms against which the bees were humming. Their hum ran in
his head so that he failed to notice that the sound of musketry had
died down. An hour before it had been death to walk, as he did,
under the convent wall and out into the street leading to the lesser
breach. The convent had, in fact, surrendered, and its defenders
were even now withdrawing up the hill to the citadel. He found the
lesser breach and climbed down it to the shore of the Urumea, beside
the deserted ford across which the Portuguese had waded on the
morning of the second assault. Beyond it shone the sandhills,
hiding our batteries.

He sat down on the bank and pulled off boots and socks, preparing to